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Notes -
The PRC's doing another round of drills around Taiwan.
There's a real possibility that this one is the ruse of war that the others were meant to make believable; all the stars have basically aligned. The charm offensive failed in 2019-20 with the Darth Vader stunt on Hong Kong, there's a shitshow of a US election campaign in progress (two assassination attempts plus a disqualification attempt), the US President is significantly demented, William Lai got elected Taiwanese President earlier this year, and October's a good month in terms of weather conditions for amphibious assault, plus Beijing's adversaries are re-arming and Biden will be gone before April so that puts some degree of time pressure on them.
I wouldn't panic just yet; even if this is the big one (and it may not be), my guess is that they won't open WWIII with a nuclear first strike on CONUS/Europe/Australia (pre-emptive ASAT use to wipe out US satellites - and probably destroy all other low-earth-orbit satellites as collateral damage - is a possibility, though, so you may lose any communications dependent on those). But anything that you might have trouble doing later - beating the rush to buy bottled water/non-perishable food/aluminium foil/iodide tablets or whatever (not all of those are applicable to all of us), or maybe starting construction of a fallout shelter - this is your advance warning. As far as Guam/Japan/South Korea go, there may be pre-emptive missile attacks on US bases, but I still wouldn't expect cities nuked as part of the opening move so my advice is mostly the same. But if you're in Taiwan itself, I'd suggest getting out; if this goes hot there'll likely be a blockade attempt by the PLAN, so you may not be able to get out later.
To be clear, I'm more worried now than I've been since at least 2017 (the Trump-Kim yelling match) - and I was in Melbourne then, and thus personally at risk. I was mildly nervous back in April of this year, but you'll note that I didn't make a post like this then.
Remember that your life is worth a lot more than a few hundred bucks; it is rational to take action even if you rate the chance of nuclear war as "small but significant". Remember also that it is good to survive; while QoL might suck in the immediate aftermath of a nuclear war, we'll recover, and if you have any ideological goals you will in almost all cases help them more if you're still around to advocate and act for them (note that if you're in the military or can otherwise help win the war, that's a worthy cause; I'm not advising desertion). That said, good luck to us all and I hope I'm worried over nothing.
m9m out.
EDIT: The drills seem to have completed; we seem to be safe for now.
I've said before: as long as China is ascendant there is little reason to force the issue today. Prior comment here. So the assumption that China is going to act aggressively now depends on the idea that Chinese leadership thinks that things are going to get worse for China rather than better. I'm not going to rehash prior points about "faked" Chinese economic and population statistics and HBD, but looking at the headlines today:
-- Has the PRC seen news that makes them think the USA is going to get stronger in the near future? While Biden is an uninspiring leader, I don't see much improvement on the horizon. Kamala is singularly inexperienced and disrespected. Trump is chaotic, and while he's no fan of China he also isn't going to be in favor of tremendous foreign aid to Taiwan. If Trump succeeds in reshoring manufacturing, decoupling in any material way is ten years or more away. In the short term, I don't see tremendous upside for the USA.
-- Is the news about China's economy worse than we think? Maybe this is the big one, or at least some people in China think it might be? I've been reading the China Property Bubble Bursting story for what feels like five years now, but maybe it's actually happening? Does the PRC, related to faked stats in population etc, feel that their economy is about to pull back in such a way that they won't have the capacity to invade?
-- Is there an unknown unknown in Chinese culture that I'm not aware of? Some crisis within the leadership or population that makes this necessary?
-- Totally unfounded speculative conspiracy theory: China makes the move now because they've made a deal with Trump, by which Trump agrees to publicly oppose any US intervention and allow the annexation to happen in exchange for some deal once he's in office. Biden would not be able to act practically speaking if Trump put the kibosh on it, without Republican cooperation action in congress is impossible, and if Trump spoke out hard enough you start to worry about officers in the Navy following orders. That's one unique weakness of this moment: Trump wouldn't even have as much power to hand it to them after the election.
-- More speculation: China has some wunderwaffen they feel will allow them to win the conflict, and wants to act before it is discovered or countered by the USA.
-- Speculative AI timelines?
Any other reasons to do this today, rather than continue to wait and watch?
A few things:
-They don’t want to do it while Trump Is president. Trump’s reputation is different in China. He’s not considered a hapless buffoon. He’s kind of a Vladimir Putin figure. They don’t like him but they see him as extremely ruthless and cunning.
-China was worried by what they saw during the Ukraine War. Blitz offensives have become a thing of the past. China doesn’t want to give Taiwan another decade to turn themselves into an even spinier hedgehog. Especially since there’s a bipartisan consensus in America to give them tons and tons of weaponry.
-America is uniquely distracted and overstretched at this point. Ukraine is taking up a lot of energy and weapons. No matter how the Ukraine war ends, it will eventually end, and America will likely be free to finally focus all its energy on the Pacific. The Middle East is also exploding, and could end up in an a full open war between Iran and Israel. China has its best military shot if it goes now.
-America is weak and divided, but there’s no guarantee it’s going to stay that way. America has had plenty of stunning comebacks in its history and it’s very possible that 2030s America is much stronger and more United than it is now.
-Peter Zeihan’s frantic proclamations of imminent Chinese collapse are overstated, but China will probably have a weaker hand in ten to twenty years. And aging population, fewer expendable young men, a slower economy.
-Taiwan’s attitude has been hardening up for years now. They increasingly see themselves as as their own separate political and cultural thing. Peaceful reunification is going to get harder, as would any military occupation.
-The AI race: military action against Taiwan would at least temporarily or permanently knock out a lot of America’s best chip fabs, and possibly allow China to actually take them. Either would give China a considerable leg up.
Huh, really? Where'd you find this out?
One of the biggest mistakes Western China watchers make is hyper focusing on the opinions of like 20m ultra online netizens who regularly discuss international geopolitics, an extreme minority of the Chinese public.
But what does that mean for the above question, exactly?
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